


Lycaon

by distractionpie



Category: Wolf 359 (Radio)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Werewolf, Although is it really an AU?, Gen, Nothing here actually goes against canon, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-30
Updated: 2019-07-30
Packaged: 2020-07-25 18:15:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,291
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20030194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/distractionpie/pseuds/distractionpie
Summary: Being back on earth doesn't mean being free of troubles and, while they're waiting to get back to their lives, personal problems spill over.Isabel is no big fan of what Jacobi's deal is, but like hell is she going to let it go either.





	Lycaon

Jacobi has been antsy.

Admittedly, they’ve all been on edge since returning to earth. While they were trapped in the nightmare that was life on the Hephaestus station it had been easy to idealise home and its apparent promise of a more peaceful life. It was only on landing that they’d had to re-acknowledge the grimmer realities of the bureaucracy of returning from the dead, especially while Goddard Futuristics still exists and is perhaps all the more dangerous for being headless without Cutter and Pryce, plus things costing money that it turns out most of them don’t have access to what with having been declared dead.

But two weeks after landing, Jacobi has become antsier than usual, and without any obvious reason.

They’re living in Goddard provided accommodation, which makes Isabel’s skin crawl, but it’s not like they have a whole lot of options when all of those who returned except Pryce have been declared dead. Officially there’s some sort of inquest going on, but Isabel trusts none of it. Still, if Goddard couldn’t keep her from stopping their plans in space they stand no chance on earth, so she’ll take advantage of their hospitality for the time being while she privately assembles a case to destroy them.

Still, it means they’re all in each other’s pockets, so there’s no way of ignoring that Jacobi keeps pacing non-stop and, according to Hera who shamelessly eavesdrops on all of them, has made several attempts to get private meetings with higher-ups and permission to leave the compound.

He’s up to something.

Isabel doesn’t know what, when Goddard screwed him nearly as thoroughly as the rest of them, but there’s no way she’s letting him get away with it.

She’s asked Hera to keep a closer eye on him and had words with Renée about her opinion of the situation, not that she gets far on that route when Renée is trying too hard to convince herself that now they’re on earth things can go back to normal, whatever that was, but she’s not got anything more specific than general sketchiness from him when Jacobi calls a house meeting.

That’s unexpected. Renée likes house meetings and tries to have them every time an issue arises or there’s an update on Goddard’s investigation. And Doug has called a few when he thinks he has something to share, while Hera has no need for them as she can talk to all of them in different places simultaneously if she wants to. Isabel doesn’t have the patience to wait for everyone to get together, will hunt them down and speak with them one by one if she has something to share -- and she always has to hunt for Jacobi, because Jacobi hates house meetings with a passion.

So she’s suspicious when she joins the others in the kitchen, and her concerns are only slightly allayed by that fact Jacobi is scowling and so this meeting probably isn’t the by-product of some Goddard issued personality-transplant.

It's hard to believe that he's planning on announcing whatever he's scheming, but Isabel's intuition is yelling that this can hardly not be connected to the way he's been sneaking around suddenly. 

"What do you want?" she says, not bothering to take a seat. "I've got shit to do."

“This won't take long. None of you are allowed in the garden on Tuesday night,” he declares. It's an odd demand, seemingly innocuous, but Isabel has learnt by now that so many of Goddard's acts of evil began that way and, while Jacobi might have been on the outs with command back on the Hephaestus regarding the destruction of humanity, now they're back on earth and they aren't his only option for survival and Isabel doesn’t doubt Goddard have plenty of means of swaying his loyalty back.

Around the table, Renée is frowning and Doug looks confused. Hera hasn’t _ said _anything but Lovelace gets the sense that she’s wondering where the fuck Jacobi gets off ordering them into confinement. Or maybe that’s just her projecting.

“No.”

“That wasn’t a question,” Jacobi says, glaring at her.

“And you don’t get to give me orders, Jacobi,” she says. Renée, who’s been very insistent upon trying to get them to stray away from mission protocols now they no longer apply, shoots Isabel a look but doesn’t try and stop her. “I’ve spent enough time shut in when the only option for going outside was in a space suit, I’m not going to accept that now we're on earth.” She might not know what he's up to, but any plan that limits her teams means of breaking out of here if Goddard should try and push it is a plan Isabel won't be cooperating with.

Jacobi scoffs. "Got a touch of claustrophobia?" he sneers. "Whatever. Trust me, if you go out on Tuesday night, you'll get a lot worse than feeling a little twitchy."

“Are you _ threatening _me?” she says incredulously. Surely Jacobi can’t think that’s a good idea? Unless he’s somehow talked Goddard into backing up whatever he’s planning - or he’s doing this on their orders.

“I’m _ warning _you,” he retorts, stepping forward into her space in a way that doesn’t exactly scream non-threatening and has Renée pushing her chair back, ready to jump in. Out of the corner of her eye she can see Doug looking nervously between them. Back on the Hephaestus he’d surprised her more than once with his willingness to step into a fight when he felt it was called for, but she’s not sure how this new memory-less version of Doug will respond without the reference of memories of past conflicts.

“Why can’t they go outside?” Hera interjects.

“Yes, Jacobi,” Isabel says, “Why can’t we go outside?”

“You can go outside as much as you want,” Jacobi snaps. “Just... not on Tuesday night.”

“Why would the yard be any less safe on Tuesday night than usual?” Renée asks mildly.

“Because I’m using it,” Jacobi growls. “So you all need to stay indoors.”

“Is this an explosives thing?” Doug cuts in. “Because if you’re blowing something up out there you could just say so.”

“Uh, no,” Isabel cuts in. Left to their own devices, Doug and Renée would make far too many concessions because they prioritised consideration for others over their own interests. It was why she wasn’t leaving Goddard’s compound until she could take them with her. “We’re all stuck here and it’s a shared space. You can’t just call dibs.”

“I mean, I know I’m still catching up on a lot of stuff,” Doug remarks, “But I’m pretty sure that’s exactly how dibs works.”

Isabel rolls her eyes. “Well, dibs overruled.”

“And that’s not how dibs--”

"Oh for fucks sake!" Jacobi slams both hands down on the table with enough force that for a moment Isabel thinks it might break. "You need to stay out of the stupid shitty yard on Tuesday night because it's a goddamn full moon and I'm a werewolf."

There’s a long moment. Isabel hadn't noticed the kitchen tap was leaking.

"Hera?" Doug says hesitantly.

"No Doug," she responds instantly. "Nobody expected you to know that."

Isabel grimaces sympathetically. It's been hard enough for Doug to figure out earth norms what with his missing memories and the fact the crew kept inadvertently muddling things by sharing their experiences without making it clear to him that plant monsters and corporate murder weren't things that most people expected in their lives. 

Hell, she's having a hard time wrapping her head around this one. It doesn't feel like a joke, what she's seen of Jacobi's sense of humour suggests an inclination more towards sarcasm than pranks and he hasn't exactly been in a joking mood since the mutiny. And if this is a Goddard engineered mind game it's a particularly nonsensical one. 

"Really Jacobi, that's what you're going with?" she says. "You don't get your own way so you start telling crazy lies and expect us to play along?"

"You don't think I could come up with a better lie than that?" Jacobi scoffs. And that's true, Jacobi might not have been the mastermind of SI5 but he's hardly an inexpert liar. All that means though, is that Isabel is going to have to think a little longer to figure out his angle.

"This is a pretty unusual thing to just ask us to take your word on," Renée says, attempt at placation obvious in the way there's none of the emphasis on the fact Jacobi's word in particular might be unreliable that Isabel would have employed. "And I know being stuck in place now we're back on earth has been difficult, but if you need space there are better ways of--"

"Look out of the windows on Tuesday night if you fucking must," Jacobi grumbles, in a tone that suggests he'd really rather they didn't. "You'll see."

"And until we see we're supposed to just take your word for it and shut ourselves in?" Isabel persists. 

"Jeez, why do you care so much about being shut in?" Jacobi bitches. "If Goddard decides to destroy the evidence of their fuck-ups by having us killed it's not going to make a difference if we're here or not. SI5 might have been the best but they've got other options and--" 

"And if we beat you--" 

"--if it comes to it, they could just overwhelm you with numbers," Jacobi finishes. 

"Charming," Doug mutters and Isabel allows herself a moment of amusement. It's easier than letting herself contemplate if Jacobi's words stem simply from residual misplaced faith in his employer's power or if her own hopes of taking down the corporation are in vain.

"Can we get back to the point," Hera cuts in. "I can't find any information in my databanks on werewolves that isn't clearly flagged as fictional."

"Of course not, Pryce wouldn't program you with information you wouldn't need to know," Jacobi says. "Honestly, I know you people are familiar with the concept of secret."

"We do understand, but surely you understand our difficulty," Renée replies firmly. "You're claiming to be something that as far as the rest of us know only exists in fiction, and you haven't been able to provide any real evidence."

"Oh, I'm sorry, I'll just go fetch my official certification in werewolfdom," Jacobi snarls. "It's mostly a full moon thing, except for details that could easily be explained away by more normal reasons, and the next full moon is Tuesday which is why I'm subjecting myself to this stupid conversation. Though I'm beginning to think that I should have just let you find out the hard way."

"Hold up, Tuesday is the next full moon sure, but I've got more than a month of memories with you in and everyone else has known you even longer. How hasn't this come up before?" Doug says, voice taking on the firm tone he's developed whenever he wants to assert his knowledge despite all he's forgotten. "That trip back to earth lasted long enough that a couple of full moons have to have happened and I'm pretty sure we all would have noticed you turning into a ravening beast on the shuttle."

"You'd hope," Jacobi mutters, before adding more clearly, “But we were in whole other star systems for most of the trip and once I’m nearer to another moon than earth’s, it stops being an issue.”

“Were you sure of that before going into space?” Renée asks, and of course her first thought upon taking the idea seriously is concern for her crew. Their priorities haven’t always aligned but Isabel trusts Renée’s judgement to be sound in this. The question might not be all that relevant to their situation now, but the thought of a danger she hadn’t been aware of bothers her and she can’t help wondering what Jacobi have done if their return flight had placed them in the vicinity of earth’s moon while it was full. She wonders what they all would have done. “What if you had transformed on the station?”

“Kepler assured me it wouldn’t be an issue.”

“And how did he know?” Hera asks. "There's nothing in your personnel file about previous space missions, although there's nothing in there about you being a werewolf either. But was sending you up another of their experiments, or were there secret tests of the effects of space flight on other werewolves before you were assigned to the mission?"

There is a pause and as it drags on Isabel begins to suspect that Jacobi never asked. Kepler had given him an order and Jacobi had never questioned if it was reasonable or safe or sane, or even on what basis Kepler was making his decisions, he’d just followed. It was disturbing.

"God, you really were Kepler's pet attack dog," she blurts out, and if looks could kill she's not sure even mysterious alien resurrection abilities would save her from the glare Jacobi levels her way.

"Ooooh, original. Not. Perhaps you could make some friends in Goddard yet with that thinking," he growls.

"So are command aware of your status?" Renée interrupts. 

"Some." Jacobi shrugs. "It was an off the books asset. The details were officially need to know, but most people knew there was something and even Goddard employees have water cooler gossip."

"Most people knew something?" Doug echoes incredulously. "Just, y'know, 'how was your weekend, so you think there'll be doughnuts at the meeting, there goes Daniel the office werewolf’?"

"Of course they didn't know the something was being a werewolf, but it was obvious there had to be a thing, Maxwell was a genius and Kepler was... Kepler. SI5 was made up of exceptional people, they wouldn't have put an ordinary explosives expert on the team."

Isabel suspects that Jacobi is rather underselling himself there, but frankly his whole involvement with SI5 seems like it was indicative of more issues than she has the time or patience to unpack. "But you said the werewolf thing didn't affect you in space."

"I said the transformations didn't happen, but I didn't just stop being a werewolf. The heightened senses and durability don't go away. That's how I survived the explosion that took out Riemann. You didn't really think I just somehow jumped out of the way, did you?"

They look at each other for a moment, before Renée says slowly, "You surviving the blast was surprising, but what other explanation did we have at the time?" 

"After everything else that happened, I don't know why you'd think that would be the line for unbelievable," Isabel adds. 

“But me being a werewolf is?” Jacobi retorts.

He has a point. 

“Okay. You’re a werewolf,” Renée says, in a tone that makes it clear that the debate is over. She’s decided to roll with this and is moving on to how. “Is there anything that helps?”

"I already told you to stay out of my way,” Jacobi says. “What part of that is so difficult?”

Isabel snaps. “Jacobi! Like it or not, we’re in this shit together, now is there anything that helps?” She’s not going to just wait inside. If this shit is happening, she’s going to do what she can to control it.

For a moment Jacobi sits, hunched over and tense, every inch of him screaming that he’s torn between fight and flight in a way that has Isabel tensing too because she knows which side of that line Jacobi usually comes down on. And then, like the word is forced out of him, Jacobi spits, “Pack.”

“Like Twilight?” Doug offers and everyone ignores that it’s a weak attempt at replicating the ease with which he dropped obscure references before Pryce had invaded his mind.

“Do you mean your family?” Renée says, more cautious.

“I mean SI5.”

_ Ah. _

“So, were Kepler and Maxwell werewolves too?” Hera asks.

Jacobi shakes his head.

“But they were pack?”

“Pack doesn’t have to be other wolves. I mean, it usually is,” Jacobi shrugs. “But mostly it’s about what your instinct wants and who the wolf trusts. And they were mine.”

“Well, is there anything they did to support you that we can help with?” Renée offers.

“It’s not something you do, it’s something you are,” Jacobi says. “Just stay out of the yard. The fences are good and there’s guards beyond that if they don’t hold, but I’ll still be out of control. Especially when it’s also my first shift without any pack since...”

He chokes.

Fuck Isabel’s life, because reality has been hitting them all hard since getting back to earth, but the way Jacobi’s voice breaks makes it sound like maybe it’s hitting him all over again that his team, evil manipulative monsters though they might have been, don’t have his back anymore and now he’s going to have to go it alone.

Or possibly he’s not going to try and go it at all, from the too casual way he’d mentioned Goddard’s armed guards as a plan B if the perimeter didn’t hold him.

Well, to hell with that. Isabel might not like Jacobi, but they’re dealing with this shit together. 

"What about before SI5?" she says. He must have had a life before recruitment and it would be too neat of a coincidence for him to have become a werewolf at the same time he met the people who claimed made it better. After all, how could he say things were better with SI5 unless he had something to compare to?

But the fact he says they made things better means that it's not exactly a surprise when Jacobi looks past all of them and offers up only a curt, "Bad."

Renée sighs. “I know this is a personal matter, but if you’re dangerous we need to know more. This place wasn’t meant as a safehouse and those doors aren’t exactly solid. If a werewolf is anything like a full-grown regular wolf, well, us staying indoors is better than nothing but I’d feel safer if we had a more substantial plan.”

Isabel could mention the gun she'd snuck past Goddard to secret away under her mattress for emergencies but she knew the others hadn't liked that approach on the Hephaestus and were likely to be even less accepting of the suggestion now they were on earth. And truthfully, however much of a bastard Jacobi could be, Isabel would prefer to avoid a situation where she'd have to kill him.

“I... something to distract the wolf might help. Make you less interesting targets,” Jacobi says and Isabel is relieved by the fact that he does at least seem to be taking their concerns seriously. “But I’m probably not going to break the doors down, I already talked to the Goddard doctors about sedatives to limit the damage I can do.”

“Why not just sedate you into unconsciousness on Tuesday afternoon and avoid the whole issue?” Hera asks.

Jacobi shakes his head. “What they’re offering won’t make me unconscious, just weaker. There’s nothing that can reliably put me out when I’m shifted and sedating me before I shift just means I wake up already a wolf and pissed about it. But numbed up I shouldn’t be able to do too much damage as long as nobody does anything stupid to make themselves an easy target.”

“Do you trust these Goddard doctors?” Renée says.

“Not to take advantage of my sedated state and try and do experiments or use me to make werewolf super soldiers?” Jacobi asks, looking suddenly amused.

Renée sighs. “It doesn’t seem beyond them.”

“Morally? No. But they already tried it once and it did not go well for them.” There’s a flash of bloodlust on his face that would be unsettling if Isabel didn’t already know the monstrous things Jacobi is capable of. “The ones I got were the lucky ones, at least it was quick. Kepler declared they were trying to undermine his authority over SI5 and that’s the sort of thing that gets an example made of the perpetrator. Or... got. But even without that issue, I don’t think any of the doctors would risk it.”

“That’s how Kepler and Maxwell helped you?” Isabel asks. “Keeping people from messing with you while you were shifted.”

“That was just a side benefit. Being around them helped me keep my head on straight,” Jacobi says slowly. “Even with them, the change was disorienting but the familiarity helped. And they were... well, it doesn’t matter now. All that matters is that you stay out of the yard so I can transform in peace without biting anyone.”

“I dunno,” Doug says, “It would be pretty cool to be a werewolf... Or...” he wilts at Jacobi’s sudden snarl. “Or maybe not, I suppose?”

“Not cool,” is Jacobi’s firm agreement. “And if I run into you while I’m changed, I won’t turn you, I’ll gut you.”

“Hey, hey, settle down,” Renée says. “Now you’ve explained we can work something out, there’s no need for threats.”

“I keep telling you,” Jacobi says. “It’s not a threat, just a warning. With a pack, I was dangerous and wild but with them it was, it was still wildness but calm or at least calmer. Without them... Well, before them the shifts were rabid and going from having a pack to not isn’t going to have improved my control... Plus there's the fact I have no idea what side effects there might be from not having shifted in so long," he concludes, glaring at Isabel as if she was somehow responsible for his lack of critical thinking skills rather than just the one who pointed them out.

And she hasn’t missed the way he's sidestepped the possible impacts of having lost that which supposedly mitigated the effects of the transformation.

“There are other werewolves, right?” Doug asks.

Jacobi rolls his eyes. “No, I’m a special snowflake. Of course there are other werewolves. It’s not like I just randomly started turning into a wolf every full moon.”

“So can they help?”

“There are others, but it’s not like there’s a yearly reunion. Most packs are secretive and insular,” Jacobi explains. “I was lucky to get an explanation and a heads up about what to expect when I was turned, from what I’ve heard a lot of packs would just kill someone who accidentally survived a bite rather than risk exposure.”

“That’s not good enough,” Isabel snaps. “We need a plan.”

“I’ve told you the plan,” Jacobi retorts. “Drugs and staying the hell out of my way.”

Isabel opens her mouth to argue, but Renée cuts her off. “Okay. On Tuesday we’ll secure the door and stay in the house, isn’t that right guys?”

Doug, loyal to his commander even now, nods and it’s not like Hera has any option to leave the house regardless of Jacobi. Isabel opens her mouth to argue but then takes in the look on Renée’s face. _ Trust me _, it says, and Isabel does.

“Okay,” she concedes. “We’ll go with your dumb plan, since you haven’t left us time or given us enough information to come up with anything better. But just this once, if we’re still stuck here by the time the next full moon comes around,” though they won’t be if she can help it, “we need a better approach.”

“Whatever,” Jacobi says. “Thank god that’s over.”

They all watch as he stalks out of the room.

“Are you really just okay with this?” Isabel asks. She’s willing to follow Renée’s lead, but she needs to understand.

“He wasn’t going to tell us anything,” Renée explains. “You heard him, he barely got an explanation when he turned. If we want to know more, we’re going to have to find out for ourselves.”

“Oh my god, my new Earth career is going to be werewolf-investigator,” Doug says. “I knew you’d find me something great to do on earth, Renée. How do we start?”

“The scientific method places a great deal of emphasis on observation,” Hera offers.

“Alright,” Isabel says. “On Tuesday, we watch.”

If Jacobi can’t figure his shit out, they’ll figure it out for him. Maybe he’ll even thank them in the end.

* * *

It’s strange, waiting for the transformation, all of them clustered around the upstairs window looking out onto the yard. The view isn’t great, Jacobi has positioned himself so he’s partially obscured by shrubbery and Isabel is pretty sure it’s a deliberate move. And she can’t even get mad about it, because Hera had started talking earlier about anatomy and how shifting from human to wolf would work biologically and if her theories came even close to the truth then they’re lined up for a pretty disturbing sight.

Jacobi had claimed that shift times weren’t an exact science and, despite Hera’s complaints that measuring the movements of astronomical bodies was a scientific process and therefore Jacobi ought to be able to tell her what she needed to calculate a more precise start time, none of them want to miss it happening. But right now, five minutes from time of lunar influence, it’s just sort of boring.

"On the plus side, knowing Jacobi is a werewolf makes me feel so much better about the whole alien thing for some reason,” Isabel admits. Not that she’s planning on bonding with him over being not entirely human or anything, but still, good to know there were more things on earth as well as in the heavens.

"Okay guys, but, if I'm not getting logs mixed up, didn't the aliens once send a double of Jacobi," Doug blurts out. "Does that mean we nearly had a run in with an alien werewolf? Were-alien? Alien-wolf? Oh my god, what if we'd--"

He’s shut down by three female voices simultaneously, “Doug, no.”

**Author's Note:**

> I have no justification for this, Jacobi as a werewolf just felt right to me so I let the muse out for a spin.


End file.
